Q: During the past three and a half years, since the sexual assault by Dr. Kelehan, what has been your state of mind? 

A: Reflective. When life slows down, especially when one puts down alcohol and drugs after years of using them as a means of emotional support and “medication”, you’re left with a very raw “you”. 

I have had to concentrate on looking at the harm I’ve done to others as a result of entertaining such an extremely selfish view of life.

 That’s what drugs and alcohol do. They demand you remain selfish in an effort to keep you dependent and willing to do anything to obtain them. But, it must be noted that examining the harm you’ve done to others includes moments that you must also consider the harm that you may have done to yourself. That sort of reflection involves examining the person that I would or could have been without alcohol and drugs. That’s not easy. 

That reflection, in order to be effective, requires me to divorce myself from regret. As I write this, I’m still plagued by this regret. But, I’m told that this will pass.

Q: After the no bill decision by the grand jury in 2018, what kept you going to seek justice?

A: I don’t think I was seeking “justice” after the no-bill. I don’t know if that can be had considering the politics involved. 

I’m not even sure if there is such a thing as justice in this situation. I wrote a letter to the medical board as a cathartic exercise. It was suggested, by a therapist, that I write myself a letter forgiving myself for placing myself in that position. Also, as a “message in a bottle” exercise, 

I was asked to write a letter to a governing body and, after mailing the letter, forget about it. I did forget about it. The medical board didn’t.

Q: When you contacted the Texas Medical Board to file charges, did you think you had a chance of vindication or were you just going through the motions, trying anything to get justice.

A: I had no expectations. And, after the political (situation)in East Texas, I was jaded and carried around the idea that no one would care.

Q: What were your thoughts during the hearing? At the time the board announced its decision?

A: I was relieved to have been given the opportunity to tell my story and have it behind me. I wasn’t too anticipatory concerning the verdict. It was almost a non-issue in my mind. I truly felt better after simply testifying and that’s all I was seeking to begin with.

Q: There will be a followup hearing by the medical board to determine if Dr. Kelehan is permanently suspended from practicing medicine, but the decision to forbid him or any physicians assistants from seeing patients, administering any prescriptions for drugs or do telemedicine consults is pretty crippling for a practicing physician.

Your thoughts?

A: I believe the whole affair is sad. There is no “gain” in this situation. I’ve never said Dr. Kelehan is a bad person or a bad physician.I don’t think there’s anyone on this earth who can say that. 

Conversely, there’s not many people who can say I lived a “good” life. There’s plenty of people that can rightly claim that I was a “bad” person by all the normal standards of society. Even so, I don’t know when I stopped being a “person”, even with the adjectives, and should simply be okay with being drugged and taken advantage of. That never sat right with me. 

In a way, that’s the kind of attitude that contributed to keeping me intoxicated over all those years. I always discounted my worth as a human and accepting that behavior from another human is nothing but an exercise in self loathing.

 I simply needed to talk about what happened and find a way of releasing myself from my past surrounding that time of my life.

Q: Watching your mother Sandy Dunham testify for Dr. Kelehan must have been hard. Thoughts about watching that?

A: I was only disturbed when my mother testified. I knew that was a possibility. In fact, I would have been surprised if they’d not called her as a character witness.

 I was only disturbed because she looked very tired and I knew, once again, I was partly responsible for that. You see, it’s been some years since I’ve seen my mother and not many kind words were passed between us in the prior years.

 I didn’t disagree with anything she said about my prior dishonesty. And, knowing her well, I knew she was fine with relaying all the dirty inter-family secrets that would discredit me. That’s never been a problem for her. 

My problems with addiction and alcohol have always been something that she refused to look at from a logical perspective. Just as she refused to ever review the evidence in this situation, my mother refused to acknowledge alcohol as an issue beyond, “just don’t drink”.

 In 20 years of multiple rehabs and visits to ICU surrounding alcohol, she never once visited me or called me.  

My mother’s take on alcoholism was always an emotional one. And a regurgitation of my past in that hearing was possibly emotionally soothing for her.  My past is low hanging fruit and I really take no offense to it being used. 

I truly hope she felt better afterwards. I certainly owe her any amount of latitude she needs in an effort to “feel” better. 

Q: Any other thoughts?

A: Life is hard. People are strange. Tragedy is the dirt… while joy is the diamond

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By George S. Smith
Retired Editor and Publisher

Dr. Shaun Bobbi Kelehan of Marshall had his practice of medicine severely curtailed Wednesday, October 28 by the Texas Medical Board following an 11-hour disciplinary hearing. Kelehan was accused of administering drugs to a male patient and then sexually abusing him in March of 2017.

Specifically, according to a release by the board, Kelehan’s “continuation in the unrestricted practice of medicine poses ‘a continuing threat to the public welfare.’”

The board further found Kelehan “engaged in nonconsensual sexual encounters with a patient and administered medications to the patient during these encounters.” The board determined that no “record of treatment” was provided to the patient.

Based on a complaint from Marshall native Steven Trey Wood, which was backed up by video and audio recordings, Marshall Police Department investigation documents and a months-long investigation by Samer Shobassy, board litigation staff attorney, Kelehan was handed an initial harsh punishment. The board decreed:

• Kelehan could no longer administer medical treatment to male patients;
• He can not prescribe prescription drugs to male patients.
• The doctor’s Physician Assistants (PA) at his clinics could not see male patients;
• Female patients can only be seen at his clinics; and
• Kelehan cannot provide telemedicine sessions.

Additionally, the board will meet within a few weeks, after an evaluation of medical needs in the communities in which he has clinics to determine whether to permanently suspend his license to practice medicine.

Kelehan is owner of Marshall’s Access Family Health clinic on Alamo Boulevard. He is also listed on the internet as an owner and a physician at a clinic by the same name on Judson Road in Longview, a third clinic on Fifth Street in Tyler and another one on Wells Branch Parkway West in Pflugerville.

He is a 2000 graduate of the University of Texas School of Medicine in Houston. He also is listed as a co-owner of Wellness Properties of America, a property owner and management company that buys and builds commercial buildings.

In mid-2017, charges brought against Kelehan following an investigation by Marshall Police Department’s Det. Rob Farnham . Harrison County District Attorney Coke Solomon, recused himself for the case, citing the fact Kelehan was his personal physician.

A special prosecutor from Longview was appointed and a grand jury was called. The grand jury declined to bring charges, delivering a nolle proseui ruling (will not prosecute). Wood was not called to testify, nor did the grand jury members hear or see the recordings of Kelehan the medical board heard of him admitting the acts.

During the police investigation of the charges, Wood was requested to meet with  Kelehan and make, first, audio recordings, which he did. He was later requested to make video recordings, and secured two videos, with Kelehan admitting the sexual encounter. In one of the recordings, Kelehan admitted a previous sexual encounter, which Wood did not remember taking place.

Wood is a graduate of Marshall High School, a former Maverick football player and a former student at Texas Tech. He is also a former blogger for the Marshall News Messenger, winning two first place awards in state press association contests for his articles.

Wood will be the first to admit that for most of his life, he has gone out of his way to get into trouble. While he said it would be an “easy out” to blame myriad circumstances in his life for “wasting big part of his life,” he blames no one but himself. “I chose to do what I did at the time I did it,” he said. ‘Me. All the misfortunes in my life fall right back on me.”

In addition to trying every addictive substance he could obtain, he spent more than two years in a Texas prison for “robbing a drug dealer.” He makes no excuses for his actions – “Whatever trouble I got into, I deserved it.”

Of the sexual assault, Wood said, “I am an alcoholic who has been clean for almost two years.” A regular at Austin Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, he said, “I know what hitting rock bottom means. But, nothing in my life led me to deal with a situation like this.”

Wood said, “I was betrayed at the hands of a friend. A homosexual encounter … no, apparently two encounters … that I have never thought about on any level, was pushed on me by a person I knew was gay but who also implicitly knew I was not gay. I had derailed previous attempts at ‘gay play.’ When he previously tried to put his hands down my pants, I would tell him to stop, that I didn’t think it was funny. He had always complied.”

In March of 2017, when Wood readily admitted he was at rock-bottom during a breakup of a personal relationship. He went to Kelehan residence in Marshall for help and drugs to deal with the pain, emotional and physical. Kelehan let him stay in his guest house.

Wood said, “He decided to do what he wanted to do to me, to take advantage of my self-destructive condition by lying to me and administering drugs that incapacitated me; the drugs basically paralyzed me.”

After the incident, this writer, a longtime friend drove to Marshall, picked up Wood and took him to his home in Southwest Arkansas almost a week, until a visit to a Texas rehab facility could be arranged.

A surprise witness at the medical board hearing was Sandy Durham of Marshall, Wood’s mother. She testified for the defense. When asked by Shobassy if she had seen the video of Kelehan admitting he had sexually assaulted her son, she said she had not. She was then asked if she did view the video that showed Kelehan admitting the abuse, if Kelehan then told her that he did not commit the act, would she believe her son or Kelehan. She replied she would believe Kelehan.

Shobassy had no further questions for Dunham.

The Texas Medical Board is the state agency mandated to regulate the practice of medicine by Doctors of Medicine (MDs) and Doctors of Osteopathic Medicine (DOs) in Texas. The Board consists of 12 physician members and seven public members appointed for a six-year term by the Governor and confirmed by the Senate. 

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